“My main concern was not so much with grade inflation as grade compression, and having a way of rewarding students who do truly excellent work,” Feldman said. “We don’t have that at the moment because 25 percent [of students] get full A’s.”

But Undergraduate Council President Matthew W. Mahan ’05 said he “would absolutely be opposed” to a proposal like Princeton’s.

“I don’t think it helps anyone but Harvard’s image to impose arbitrary caps,” Mahan said.

Mansfield said he hopes that the proposed changes at Princeton would spark renewed discussion of the issue at Harvard.

“One of the things we need to start doing is talk—to get people talking on the subject and explaining just what it is that’s wrong with grade inflation,” he said. “I think a lot of the faculty don’t realize the harm that it’s doing, and they don’t realize either that they’re degrading the value of their colleague’s grades.”

Feldman noted the challenge in garnering faculty support to fight grade inflation.

“It’s a very difficult problem because faculty members certainly all insist on having the right to set grades,” he said. “It’s something that has to be done by a consensus of the faculty, and that’s what makes it such a difficult problem to solve, and it has to be done in a way that’s not coercive.”

Mansfield said that while the Princeton move was heartening for foes of grade inflation, reform at Harvard is not necessarily on the horizon.

“I wouldn’t be too optimistic, but it is a sign that one of our major friends and rivals is seriously thinking about acting on the subject,” he said. “So it’s not just one crazy professor.”

—Staff writer Stephen M. Marks can be reached at marks@fas.harvard.edu.